Chapter 39
It was almost time to wake up the next watch when haunting baying pierced through the still air. Roboco narrowed her eyes as she peered past the dying flames of the pyre into the darkness. Suddenly, multiple red eyes appeared in the darkness. She immediately jumped to her feet and unshouldered her longbow, her eyes narrowing in wariness. Two more howls were heard as well as something being dragged on the open ground. She also heard the faint sound of something tearing, something she couldn't identify.
She turned to fling the sliding door open and shouted, "Get up, we're under attack!"
Her breath hitched as she found a scarecrow with glowing red eyes looming over the stirring party. Behind it was a large hole in the wall, apparently torn open. Quickly, she drew her bow and fired two shots at it. As the party started moving and freaking out at the scarecrow, she gasped in pain as she felt arrows and teeth nipping on her legs and back. She spun around and saw a team of kenku with shortbows at the entrance to the shrine. She also spotted more scarecrows stepping forward under the faint moonlight. Yet, she also clearly felt something biting her as well. Thankful that her limbs were made of living wood and metal, she tried peering through the darkness to find the source but to no avail.
"Alright, what's going on?" asked Lamy as four of the party gathered around the hunter.
"We got animated scarecrows, more kenku's, and some invisible monsters… at least I think they are invisible," she informed them, noticing and assuming the absent monk was busy taking care of the scarecrow that showed up in the sleeping area.
Before more questions could be asked, one of the approaching scarecrows suddenly let out an unnatural shriek and directed its harshly glowing eyes at them. As it grew brighter, Roboco was suddenly assailed with horrid visions of everyone in the town dying around her, slain by a giant octopus-like thing that rose from the lake. She was going to shoot when a large tentacle wrapped around her, pinning her arms to her side and breaking her longbow to bits. She struggled to get out of its grip, but she was slammed onto the ground and tossed into a wrecked house. As she felt something piercing through her chest from behind, she blacked out.
"Roboco! Ah!" shouted Lamy as an arrow punched through her weapon hand, forcing her to drop her mace. Before she could retrieve it, the shadows suddenly coalesced and formed a large mastiff that bit her arm.
She screamed and shook her hand hastily in a terrified manner. It let go and dissipated into wisps of dark smoke. Another shadow mastiff appeared on her other side but she was thankfully still holding on to her shield and so it got nothing for its troubles.
"Shine on!" she heard Polka shouting behind her. Bright light shone out from behind her as if there was a sun in the sleeping area.
Three howls filled the air as the shadow mastiffs suddenly reappeared from the shadows, the bright light eating away their cloak of darkness.
"Good job, Polka!" she cheered on as she snapped the arrow in her hand and pulled out the shaft. She picked up her mace gingerly and proceeded to chant, "Raging storm of snow and ice, rain your hail down on my enemies!"
A clumped up formation of enemies suddenly got bombarded by snowballs raining down from on high. This was followed by a high-pitched note from Nene, causing one mastiff to break apart into black mist while one of the scarecrows burst open, its straw stuffing spilling all over the place. That left two scarecrows remaining; one shrieking and turning its terrifying gaze at them once more while the other swung its clawed arms at Aloe. For some unknown reason, she and the bard froze up after that moment.
"Aloe! Nene! Snap out of it!" shouted Botan as she took out another mastiff and caused the gazing scarecrow to stagger back as her arrow buried itself in its head.
The final mastiff shook itself out of its shock and bolted, running away from the bright light and thus the fight itself. Meanwhile, the kenku archers continued shooting at the cleric, who was getting quite annoyed by the nicks and scratches she was getting.
"A little help here!" she called out as she directed her spectral weapon at the scarecrows.
"Yahoo! Here I come!" shouted Polka as she charged down the scarecrows.
A flying kick and a punch later, the staggered scarecrow crumpling to the ground, its wooden skeleton breaking apart inside the straw body. She also lashed out with a kick against the remaining scarecrow, kicking it in the side and causing its attacks to miss the frozen succubus. Lamy added to this with a frost ray and her spectral mace after she helped to heal up Roboco.
The hunter in question shook her head as she got to her feet, saying, "Thanks, Lamy." She then shouted out, "Botan! Help with the crows!" She then raced ahead and shot at the kenku archers, downing two of the five.
"After you!" the lion girl shouted in reply as she ducked out of the building and shot at the archers as well. Two more fell while the last one got an arrow to the stomach. The remaining archer immediately ran off into the darkness.
After the last scarecrow fell to Polka and the ghostly mace, the tired party regrouped in the courtyard.
"Is everyone alright?" asked Lamy.
"I don't think I've ever been this badly injured before," stated Roboco, surprising everyone with her smile.
After taking a moment to look around, Nene said, "I think…we better go back to bed? But..."
"With my globe lighting up the place, Botan should have a better time watching over us," quipped the fennec fox monk.
"Yeah, I think I should be fine. Just turn down the light a bit," the lion girl agreed, "You all can go back to sleep."
"Alright. Thank you very much."
In the morning, the party decided to burn the fresh bodies from the night battle. After the burning and the prayers, Roboco informed them about something unexpected.
"I'm going back to the town. I have to inform the mayor about this," she informed them, "I'm sorry I can't help but this is much too important to ignore."
"We understand. Go on ahead. We'll try our best to find Choco," replied Nene.
"Yeah, wish us luck," added Botan.
After waving and saying their goodbyes, the lion girl got to work. There were barely any tracks for her to find but eventually, she found a faint blood trail that was dusted over. It led them off to the side, off the beaten path, and into a forested area. They headed inside and after an hour of walking, they found the kenku from last night, dead on the ground with several parts of him missing from their body. It seems they were eaten, either by the beasts of the forest or the mastiff that ran away. The bard looked a little ill, Aloe trying to calm her down. Another faint trail went off in one direction, with faint splatters of dried blood.
"This is getting harder to track," she muttered after a while as she looked around. Growling a little after making her observations, she continued, "Damn it, I lost the trail."
"Hey, Botan, I think we're nearing the mountainside," stated Polka as she peered through the brush, spotting the rock face of said place.
"Hng… I hope I can pick up the trail again..." she muttered as she continued onward, the rest following after her.
Lady Luck must have smiled on her as she found a paw print of dried blood leading up a rock path snaking upwards.
"Ow, nice," said Nene cheerfully, "We can continue following the trail."
"Feels a bit too easy, to be honest," stated Aloe, "Are we walking into a trap?"
"Maybe, but we aren't going to find Choco without going up," spoke up Anya suddenly, "You're just going to have to keep moving forward."
"Quite," Lamy agreed, "Let us get on with it."
The path was straightforward, much to their suspicion. After another hour, they came up to a large cave mouth. It looked like a literal fanged mouth, with strange sharpened pillars as the overtly large teeth.
"Abandon hope, ye who enter here," quipped the dagger in a spooky voice.
"Stop that. You're not helping," reprimanded the bard, tapping the hilt.
"Hmm, I do not see anything out of the ordinary," stated the half-snow elf as she peered through the darkness of the cave.
"Well, let's go in then," declared Polka as she stepped in first. The rest followed after her, making sure to keep together.
The deeper they went in the darker it went. However, when the mouth of the cave disappeared, the ceiling started being spotted with luminescent green moss, increasing in abundance the deeper they went. Strangely enough, there were plenty of spaces along the wall where the light was unable to penetrate. It made the trek inside a little… unnerving to the party.
"Are we there yet?" asked Anya cheekily.
"Shhh!" hushed the bard, tapping the hilt again.
Soon they reached the end, encountering a large cavern whose walls were mostly shrouded in shadow. Visible parts of the wall were decorated with bones and waxy deposits reminiscent of terrified faces. A large flat stone served as some sort of table with knick-knacks strewn over it. On one side was a bubbling cauldron over a fire pit emitting a creepy green glow, its contents boiling and giving off wispy green tendrils of smoke. The light from the moss has been reduced here quite a bit, but still enough to illuminate the cave dimly.
Before anyone could stop her, the fennec fox girl called out, "Hello? Is anyone home?"
"Why did you have to do that?" Aloe hissed out, "Now they know we're here. We could have-"
"Oh yes, I am," spoke out a suspiciously welcoming voice.
A figure stepped out from the shadows. Purple skin and short curved horns, dressed in an old brown dress. Shuffling over to the stone table, she brushed aside a few things and sat on it.
"Hello, little ones. I am Lola Darkmingler. What brings you to my humble abode?" she said as she smiled sweetly, a great contrast to her wrinkled, demonic looks.
"Do you know of the shrine just beyond the forest from here?" asked Nene, getting a nod from her, "We are looking for a cleric that usually visits there. Do you know where she is?"
For a moment, her smile broke into a scowl. But then, it went back to a smile pretty quickly. The monk and the archer noticed this little twitch, making them a little warier of her.
"Ah… I'm afraid that I don't know what you are talking about, dear," she told them as she smiled, "I normally keep to myself in my lonesome in my cave."
"Um... if you're sure..."
"How long have you been staying here?" asked Polka, interrupting the bard.
"Oh, we- I have been living here for quite some time now," she stated, "Occasionally, I would visit the town for my needs but that's all I do. Most of the time, I spend my time brewing my potions and the like." She then clapped her hands and asked, "Would you like to buy some?"
"I rather we do not buy stuff from a fiend," spoke up Lamy with suspicion, "Who knows what she put inside those things?"
"Oh, I assure you these are quite alright," she replied, her smile becoming a little strained, "I do not simply put anything in them. I always make them for a specific purpose. Our- I mean, my potions are perfectly potable."
"How about we skip the dancing around and get to the point?" retorted Aloe, deciding to get straight to the point, "I know you're lying. Who is this 'our' and 'we' you are talking about? Did you attack the shrine? Why did you kill them?"
She didn't answer those questions. Instead, she said, "Well, well, well, a succubus? What are you doing here? In the company of these little ones? Are you planning something, my dear?"
"Stop talking nonsense! We are asking you questions!" the succubus retorted again, more harshly this time.
"Hmm..."
"Don't tell me you're going to listen to her," complained the succubus as she turned to the cleric, who was looking at her suspiciously.
Lola started cackling randomly, bringing all the attention back to her.
"Oi, what are you laughing at?" Aloe shot back angrily.
"Oh, I don't know. How about the fact a succubus is traipsing around with four other mortals like she was one of them?" the night hag jeered, "It sounds quite hilarious to me."
"Answer the questions!" the infuriated succubus shouted, small orbs of water faintly forming on the tips of her eyes.
While this exchange was going on, the lion girl spotted something weird. "Nene… what's that?" whispered Botan as she pointed out a strangely gleaming stone sitting on the slab of stone. It looked nearly perfectly spherical… almost like an eyeball.
The bard's eyes widened a little. "I only heard of such things," she whispered back, "Supposedly hags like her can make those things out of eyeballs… but… only covens can make such things. Erm, a group of hags." She then tilted her head in confusion, muttering, "Wait... if this is a coven… where are the other two?"
"I'll ask her," stated the archer.
"What? Wait-"
"Hey, Lola. What's with that hag eye over there?" she asked aloud before the lore bard could fully protest.
"An eye? Oh, surely you must be mistaken," the hag replied with a strained smile.
"...So there were more here," growled out the succubus with a frown before she demanded, "What did you do to the tiefling?"
The hag's smile turned to a frown at a drop of a hat. "So… you are her friends, eh?" she ground out, "That damned girl tried to undo… ah, naughty, naughty." An evil grin graced her face, "I won't simply tell everything to you. No, no, no. You will have to pay for it, my dears."
"Eh, pay?" repeated Polka with a dumbfounded expression.
"Pay with what?" asked Botan in confusion.
"Why should we pay her anything?" muttered Aloe through gritted teeth.
"Erm, maybe we can barter or make a deal with her or something..." suggested Nene, trying to reason with the party.
"We refuse."
"Hmm?" sounded Lola in surprise. The rest of the party was just as surprised and they looked at the cleric.
"You, being a clearly demonic being, will not see a single copper piece from us," stated Lamy seriously, "Even if she is a succubus, I would trust Aloe a whole lot more than I trust you."
"Lamy..." muttered the succubus with a sob.
"Oh, you do, do you?" sneered the night hag before cackling out, "In that case, you'll never find your friend! Kill them, my-!"
"Surprise!" yelled Polka as she flew through the air, her foot connecting with the hag's chest. As she landed, she punched the hag's face twice, drawing first blood.
"Kill them!" shrieked the hag through her broken nose.
Two shadow mastiffs burst out of the dim light and lunged at the monk. She dodged one and shook off the other, the blessing upon her breaking to the sound of glass. As the mastiffs disappeared into the shadows again, she looked up and found the hag missing.
"Eh?"
AN: Hello again, readers. Welcome back.
Strange how things work out. The party gets attacked at night. Thanks to Polka's driftglobe, things become more manageable. The next day, Roboco goes back to Dusktown to inform the authorities about what happened while holo5 continues trying to find out what happened to Choco. Botan's tracking led them to a night hag's cave. How will they win this? We already have a driftglobe, but now this night hag can disappear too? Hmm...
On another note, I think this is the first time I used shadow mastiffs here. Bright light definitely takes a lot away from them. Do I regret giving the driftglobe to Polka? Not really. They have never met or fought them before, so the first time they saw it happening, they would be surprised it works. The second time, they would have a pretty good idea to use the driftglobe as soon as possible. In this case, I added other enemies, old and new. There are scarecrows in the cave as well as some other kind.
Next chapter, we conclude this particular encounter. Till we meet again, dear readers.